BIDDEFORD — Five championship banners cast long shadows over this year’s Biddeford and Thornton Academy boys hockey teams. The two rival schools have combined to win five of the last six Class A state championships, including the last three. This season, however, both teams are in unfamiliar territory: Looking up in the standings.
Both the Tigers and the Trojans are struggling to find consistency from game to game ”“ and from period to period. Through seven games, the Trojans sit at 4-3, while Biddeford is 3-3-1. Both teams are safely in playoff position at the moment, but not where they’ve been in previous years.
For Thornton, the growing pains were to be expected. The Trojans lost 17 starters off back-to-back championship teams, and have had to replace scoring and leadership on the fly.
“We’re looking for guys to step up, and step into roles that they’re not comfortable with,” said Thornton head coach Jamie Gagnon.
Even in victory, Gagnon has seen his team’s lumps along the way. They have gotten off to slow starts and allowed big leads to dwindle.
“We’re still the young team,” said Gagnon. “We’re still growing and making plenty of mistakes that hopefully we’re not making toward the end of the year.”
Gagnon has had to rely on sophomore goalie Andrew Huot to step up in some big games and situations, in this his first varsity year. The Trojans also have some upperclassmen who are still young ”“ experience-wise ”“ because they had to wait their turn to get on the ice.
“They’ve worked hard, and that’s half the battle,” Gagnon said.
Biddeford has had similar pains this season with youth and inexperience, but not to the degree that its neighboring rival has. The Tigers have six freshmen who have seen ice time, and they have upperclassmen who are still learning to be leaders.
The Tigers have a rock in net with senior goalie Jon Fields. It’s the play on the other end of the ice that has stunted Biddeford’s success. The Tigers have struggled on the power play since the start of the season, but head coach Rich Reissfelder said it’s not for lack of effort.
“It comes down to hard work. The boys, they keep working and working and working, and eventually they’ll go,” Reissfelder said of his team’s power play.
Reissfelder said he has players who “work their tails off.” Now, he’s just waiting for the hard work to pay off.
“It’s a progress, everything is a step. Either you’re stepping forward, or you’re stepping back,” said Reissfelder. “If we feel sorry for ourselves, then we’ll end up ”¦ waving at the playoff teams, I guess.”
The season has yet to reach the halfway point, so both teams have time to turn their fortunes around.
Gagnon said what the Trojans need to do is pretty simple to get from where they are to where they want to be.
“We have to get better each and every day,” said Gagnon.
— Contact Wil Kramlich at 282-1535, Ext. 323 or follow him on Twitter @WilTalkSports.
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